Solutions(?)

[pan]

A thread dedicated towards possible solutions rather than the rather pessimistic fare we engage in with much of our other communication.

[BO]

Doesn't help that the poor kid is being raised by a cynic. OK, a realist. Wait. I think they're the same thing.

Good luck with your plan, Pan. Make sure you have 10% of your assets in gold. Hyperinflation is gonna rear its ugly head sometime in the not-too-distant future. Poof! There goes those retirement dollars.

Check out PRPFX.

Been watching the news lately because of all the flooding in washington. My mood always sinks a bit when these events occur. It isn't the extreme weather that depresses me--its the extreme stupidity that exists in a large part of our local population and government. Amazing how people deal with disasters. They don't. Common sense seems to have left the building.

Oh well. The meth-heads being washed out of their trailers is always entertaining. (No offense to trailer-dwellers in general)

[Mouse]

Just seen the one, I like this fellow's attitude: "I am mostly here to teach before the web goes down".

[Mouse]

By the way, I don't think I mentioned that my gardening was not a great success last year if growing food was the measure. The birds, however, are still plentiful despite the frost, and they like it here very much, so they sing in the mornings..

[curt]

iPhone ? WTF ?

Sounds to me as if this dude has his head on straight. Speaking of gardening, the only plants left in our garden right now are the Rosenkohl plants. The little round yummy things just weren't big enough to harvest any sooner. We've had a long harsh winter, the plants are still alive and I'm not even sure when to harvest. This is the first time we've ever grown Rosenkohl. Ah, and the time to plant tomato seeds is NOW. Indoors of course and from the seed on up. I need to get started with that this weekend. Spring is in the air. The winter is still taking it's toll on many but Spring is real and baby, it's a comin' !

[pan]

Rosenkohl is known to USans as Brussels Sprouts or in Austria as Cabbage Sprouts. The German name made me curious and, yes, Rosenkohl (Brussels Sprouts) are related to Kohlrabi (German Turnip). The primary difference for me is that I can't stand Brussels Sprouts and love Kohlrabi.

[hannah j]

http://www.downsizer.net/

Felted slippers

Ideal for chilly winter evenings.

Sizing Digital Images

A question that comes up regularly on Downsizer is how to size an image: How do I make a picture small enough for an avatar? Is...
Hay Making by Hand

I am not an expert at hay making, but I have been asked to write an article about it, as some of you may be struggling for hay...

Keeping Rabbits for Meat

Downsizer member lottie provides an introduction to rearing your own meat.
Grow Your Own

With shop bought produce getting more expensive week by week, producing your own food makes much more...

Quick and Chunky Sock Pattern

Everything you ever wanted to know about socks but were afraid to ask....

[pan]

I was about to respond on the sizing images until I realized that that came from the downsizer site.

[Cal]

The 'Keeping Rabbits for Meat' article caught my eye ... I notice they don't say anything about how one actually goes about killing the rabbit you've so carefully raised. I think I am hyper-sensitized at the moment after a really nerve wracking weekend. My neighbours across the street had a traditional 3 day feasting ceremony ... for a wedding or a funeral or some other special event. The festivities included loud drumming and the slaughtering of two goats and an ox right there in the garden. I found it all a rather horrible and depressing clash of cultures and at the same time I was aware that my own culture is not exactly unflawed - most of us fine with eating meat but being so far removed from the actual killing of animals. I think I need to give serious attention to becoming a vegetarian .... and getting new neighbours ....

[Mouse]

Yesterday I picked the only sprout sized sprouts on my Rosenkohl, all 3 of them. They still sit beside the kitchen sink, I picked out the baby snails that lived in them. Not very appetising, so chewed up and dirtied by molluscs.

and just wandering off along a connection between stories, kittens and pharmaceuticals, that fellow I knew with the moneyied job in a drugs firm told us how he started killing,

first it was a kitten
then it was patients who annoyed him,
people who interrupted his drinking.

The kitten competed accidentally when he was a child.
So he put it in the oven in the range when they went out.


Yes. That kind of man.
Married to a close friend.
They're both dead now.

The police weren't interested,
even though the Australians had tried to have him extradited
to give evidence
regarding several deaths
in a nursing home there.

He had told us of murdering old people in Ireland,
annoying patients in a hospital.
He was a doctor first you see.




Bishop Williamson, the truth will set you free.

[Mouse]

Felting is very soothing, I do quite a lot of it compared to most people.

Mainly inconsequential things
whose purpose is even more mysterious than mine.

[Mouse]

Well, I just found out that some determined people in Greece managed to stop that massive arms shipment for the time being. How very clever of them.
Global Voices Online

[Mouse]

Man in court on foot of UK extradition warrant
Belfast Telegraph, Tuesday, 10 February 2009.

A 60-year-old man wanted in the UK on a charge of perverting the course of justice during the trial of a number of men in connection with the London bomb attacks has appeared in the High Court this afternoon.

Anthony John Hill, orginially from Sheffield, was arrested on Carrig Street in Kells this morning on foot of a warrant issued by the authorities in Britain.

It is alleged he sent DVDs entitled "7/7 Ripple Effect" to the jury, the judge and members of the victims' families.

The DVDs claimed the attack was an inside job and that the accused men were innocent.

Now here is someone who has been very brave and made a difference, and has just been arrested.
Make a sandwich, pour a beer and watch his video. It's very good.